Woman Hanged WWII"

Bob's story also come from Brownings' book. Apparently this was what one of the Police Battalion members said when he was on trial in the 60's. If you haven't read that book I highly recommend it. Although the content is very disturbing, the writing and analysis is excellent.

By moral framework, what I meant is that Germans of the 30's and 40's grew up in a world where antisemitism was very common and widely accepted. It was also a country where political violence and murder were also the norm. The effect that this may have had on the personal morals of these ordinary men can never truly be known but I don't doubt that it had an impact.

Regarding the experiments that are quoted in the social studies that are part of the book, I agree that they were disturbing and they do shed some light on the subject and the weakness of the average person. I also believe that in our society today most people tend to believe in "science" and with this in mind some people would abdicate their own responsibility for their actions and follow the instructions because they believe that the scientists know what they are doing (most people think that someone wearing a white lab coat is intelligent, educated and trustworthy). This is part of our moral framework.

 

Bob, have you a source for this?

Yes. "Choices Under Fire" by Michael Bess.

I realize that we have recently discussed this book and some of the things Bess has stated are contraversial. However, this rationalizion to me sounds pretty reasonable. If this is not exactly true, rationalizations such as this occurred.

Bob Guercio

 

From where do you propose getting "more facts"?

I doubt very much if this woman was killed by a Soviet hand, I am fairly sure she was killed by a German one. The 3 soldiers might not be smiling but they certainly arent upset by it. Their relaxed postures indicate that they are comfortable with the situation. So, that being the case, I would have little or no sympathy for their eventual fate.

Given their track record, I guess the Axis History forum might be a good place?

According to Christopher R. Browning in "Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland", the idea that dissenters were dealt with harshly is in fact a fallacy. He claims that there is no record anywhere of a German soldier, Wehrmacht, SS, Police, whatever, being punished for refusing to participate in these crimes. Unfortunately I've lent my copy out so I can't quote it.

Beyond this the book also reveals how some men stated that they could no longer continue to carry out these heinous duties and asked to be relieved and others knowing this, simply carried on.

I believe that the facts are, sadly, that very few Germans refused to participate in these actions. I believe that this has a lot to do with the moral framework within which these persons grew up in but ultimately provided with the right excuse by those in command, most people can justify just about anything. The same remains true today anywhere in the world.

From what I've been reading, at the start of WWII Hitler and the party believed adopting disciplined military standards like the British, American, etc armies did during The Great War would ensure victory. I believe I got that from here,

INDEX

If the German army wanted discipline, wouldn't allowing those who refuse such things to go free go against what the party wanted? Are you sure Browning wasn't referring to just that one unit? Isolated cases I can understand, but a "pandemic" especially in the Eastern Front is a bit hard to swallow unless I was mislead.

Edit: Stig, when it came to anti semitism it varied from region to region. There was no national requirement, the example I was given was anti semitism was higher in places like Berlin but almost non-existant in areas like Cologne. Many Jews up until the creation of Israel were tighly knit into German society, even going as far as adopting the German language over their own.

Edit 2: Exact link,

German Executions

Ironically enough, Schwinge’s shining example in this was the harsh application of military law in the French and British Army 1914-1918. Thus, in the Second World War German military law became more radical and inhumane than ever before and in any other state (except probably the Soviet Union), a development that resulted in about 15,000 German soldiers being executed between 1939 and1945.


The present British and French debate on whether collective posthumous pardons should be granted for all executed soldiers is unparalleled in Germany as far as the First World War is concerned. But this is definitely not the case for the soldiers of the Second World War. It is a painful and unfinished process to learn, that the "military values" like obedience and performance of duty so popular in German society during the first half of the 20th century were so easily perverted in World War II ending in a policy of total terror and even genocide.


In Germany, the question whether collective posthumous pardons for all executed soldiers should be granted is, therefore, being discussed only for the Second World War. The victims of the German military justice of World War I have been entirely forgotten.

 

By moral framework, what I meant is that Germans of the 30's and 40's grew up in a world where antisemitism was very common and widely accepted. It was also a country where political violence and murder were also the norm. The effect that this may have had on the personal morals of these ordinary men can never truly be known but I don't doubt that it had an impact.



I agree with you.

In my long winded post, I would have been more accurate to say that what you stated regarding moral framework is true but it is not the whole story.

Bob Guercio

 

Bob, have you a source for this?


Gotthard; I have Browning's book open right here. Page 73. A 35 yo Metal worker from Bremerhaven said:

" I made the effort, and it was possible for me, to shoot only children. It so happened that the mothers led the children by the hand. My neighbour then shot the mother and I shot the child that belonged to her, because I reasoned with myself that without its mother the child could not live any longer. It was supposed to be, so to speak, soothing to my conscience to release children unable to live without their mothers. "

Citation: Friedrich M. HW 1708.

 

Concerning the photo at the top there may be the likelyhood that the lady went out to hang herself and left a suicide note, and the (possible but not proven to be) Germans went out to look for her and are showing their happiness in having found her at last.

 

Gotthard; I have Browning's book open right here. Page 73. A 35 yo Metal worker from Bremerhaven said:

" I made the effort, and it was possible for me, to shoot only children. It so happened that the mothers led the children by the hand. My neighbour then shot the mother and I shot the child that belonged to her, because I reasoned with myself that without its mother the child could not live any longer. It was supposed to be, so to speak, soothing to my conscience to release children unable to live without their mothers. "

Citation: Friedrich M. HW 1708.

This is also quoted on page 114 in Bess's book.

Bob

 

Concerning the photo at the top there may be the likelyhood that the lady went out to hang herself and left a suicide note, and the (possible but not proven to be) Germans went out to look for her and are showing their happiness in having found her at last.

Now that's quite a stretch!!!

Bob Guercio

 

Seems a thread is already running, definietly on my watch list.

Axis History Forum • View topic - Woman Hanged in WWII

 

Concerning the photo at the top there may be the likelyhood that the lady went out to hang herself and left a suicide note, and the (possible but not proven to be) Germans went out to look for her and are showing their happiness in having found her at last.

Hard to believe that someone could actually make me laugh in a thread like this. Congrads!!!!

Elven, I don't doubt that you are correct with regard to military matters and the obedience of the German Landser, however I suspect that most commanders knew that there is a big difference between demanding your men shoot enemy soldiers in uniform, partisans, perhaps even POWs but it's entirely a different matter when it comes to murdering the elderly, women and children. With regards to the statement by Browning that there is no record of anyone being punished for not obeying this type of command, I believe that he was refering to all German units and the war as a whole and not specifically Police Battalion 101 and their time in Poland. I will need to get my book back to confirm this.

 

Hard to believe that someone could actually make me laugh in a thread like this. Congrads!!!!

Elven, I don't doubt that you are correct with regard to military matters and the obedience of the German Landser, however I suspect that most commanders knew that there is a big difference between demanding your men shoot enemy soldiers in uniform, partisans, perhaps even POWs but it's entirely a different matter when it comes to murdering the elderly, women and children. With regards to the statement by Browning that there is no record of anyone being punished for not obeying this type of command, I believe that he was refering to all German units and the war as a whole and not specifically Police Battalion 101 and their time in Poland. I will need to get my book back to confirm this.

I'm sure the difference was realized by many, I'm also sure their may have been a few cases where one would ignore orders to do such a thing. In a army of millions you will be getting both the righteous and the demented.

This is where I have trouble believing this mans work, no army can function without discipline, someone more versed than I in the German military may be able to give examples or names of work camps. Something that could be plausible is disciplinary actions were never recorded or the records were destroyed towards the end of the war because they could be used to incriminate others, but even that is a stretch.

 

I find it difficult to imagine that the Germans, who have reputation for documenting everything so much so that it's like a fetish for them, wouldn't have documented these punishments. Beyond that, if one did object and was punished by something short of death, would he not have come forth after the war to tell his story and promote the idea that "hey, some Germans did object and refuse"?

It is possible that some did refuse to participate, the the Police Battalion 101 story at Josefow where it is documented that the men were given the option to participate in mass murder or stand down and be assigned other duties, only about 12 of the 500 men there felt they couldn't perform. However the sad fact is and nobody can deny it that the vast majority of persons faced with this decision had no real issues with it.

The claim that these men did these things under threat of punishment just doesn't hold water when the few that did refuse (that we know of ) were not punished and no proof of men being punished for refusing exists.

 

I find it difficult to imagine that the Germans, who have reputation for documenting everything so much so that it's like a fetish for them, wouldn't have documented these punishments. Beyond that, if one did object and was punished by something short of death, would he not have come forth after the war to tell his story and promote the idea that "hey, some Germans did object and refuse"?

It is possible that some did refuse to participate, the the Police Battalion 101 story at Josefow where it is documented that the men were given the option to participate in mass murder or stand down and be assigned other duties, only about 12 of the 500 men there felt they couldn't perform. However the sad fact is and nobody can deny it that the vast majority of persons faced with this decision had no real issues with it.

The claim that these men did these things under threat of punishment just doesn't hold water when the few that did refuse (that we know of ) were not punished and no proof of men being punished for refusing exists.

I'm confused, you have to clarify, are you talking just about the case of the Police Battalion or the war in general in regards to these punishments? If I followed correctly, I was under the conception that the author was talking about the war in general.

 

That would be correct however, I have asked for my copy of the book back in order to allow me to quote it. Again I highly recommend this book.

 

That would be correct however, I have asked for my copy of the book back in order to allow me to quote it. Again I highly recommend this book.


Ah that makes sense, I was talking about the war in general, failure to communicate for the lose.

 

I finally got my copy of "Ordinary Men" back and here's the bit I was referring to;

"Among the perpetrators, of course, orders have traditionally been the most frequently cited explanation for their own behavior. The authoritarian political culture of the Nazi dictatorship, savagely intolerant of overt dissent, along with the standard military necessity of obedience to orders and ruthless enforcement of discipline, created a situation in which individuals had no choice . Orders were orders, and no one is such a political climate could be expected to disobey them, they insisted. Disobedience surely meant the concentration camp if not immediate execution, possible of their families as well. The perpetrators found themselves in a situation of impossible "duress" and therefore could not be held responsible for their actions. Such, at least, is what the defendants said in trial after trial in postwar Germany.

There is a general problem with this explanation, however. Quite simply, in the past forty-five years no defense attorney or defendant in any of the hundreds of post war trials has ever been able to document a single case in which refusal to obey an order to kill unarmed civilian resulted in the allegedly inevitable dire punishment. The punishment or censure that occasionally did result from such disobedience was never commensurate with the gravity of the crimes the men had been asked to commit."

So now I can be clear, Browning is talking about the whole war, not just Police Battalion 101, he's referring to the Holocaust as a whole.

 

Thought I'd already posted this.
I remember an article in After the battle (a lot of years ago) about French or Belgian civilians being shot by German troops towards the end of the war. One of the Germans refused, whereupon he was lined up with the civilians and shot along with them. His name is now amongst those on the memorial.
I'll have to trawl through about 11 volumes of back issues to look for it, as I can't remember the location or the actual issue.

 

I always had the theory that one of the reasons why people on the front may have obeyed such orders was because their families were at risk of being "attacked" by the party. The source Stig provided seems to support this theory.

Although the info Gordon provided contradicts your second paragraph.

If I understood you correctly, Browning claims across all theaters of the war, Germans who were given "wrong" tasks before them did not disobey the orders they were given, in this case, execution? They did not disobey because they feared for their own lives and the lives of their famlies back home? In a Army of millions it seems kind of war fetched to think that at least 1 person didn't "disobey". Unless they were never documented for morale and "job saftey" issues? (aka how factory owners in the U.S.S.R. would "fudge" the numbers a bit so Stalin wouldn't crack down on them).

 

Actually, Elven, why don't you just read the book yourself?

 

Actually, Elven, why don't you just read the book yourself?

I could always do that, I just have a question about the book that can be answered by anyone who has read it. It wouldn't be very feasible to buy a book every time you have a question about something the author wrote. If I had more questions on the subject or something that required deeper reading of a subject than that would definietly be something I could see happening in my immediate future.